#thank god they increased the budget for season 2

[anonymoushuman2]

another redesign of another one of the awful dresses they put Milly Alcock in. I’m trying not to change them too much and keep the colour palette as similar as possible but oh the urge to just come up with something completely different is hard to resist.

[nevertheless-moving]

I posted 162 times in 2022

66 posts created (41%)

96 posts reblogged (59%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@nevertheless-moving

@phoenixyfriend

@willowcrowned

@lullabyknell

@twinterrors29

I tagged 139 of my posts in 2022

Only 14% of my posts had no tags

#star wars - 68 posts

#murderbot - 21 posts

#nevertheless meta - 17 posts

#my au - 13 posts

#kenobi spoilers - 12 posts

#kenobi - 11 posts

#murderbot diaries - 11 posts

#tbobf - 10 posts

#stone soup - 9 posts

#ask - 9 posts

Longest Tag: 136 characters

#if you ever feel like singing or danceing or drawing or any of the things you really truly dont have to be good at them for it to be fun

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

1,026 notes - Posted February 14, 2022

#4

today we celebrate Esther for being nasty hot and sleeping with the right dude. thank u for risking your sugar daddy and also your life. from the bottom of my heart, you fucking rock. now, please join me in doing a shot in her honor.

1,178 notes - Posted March 16, 2022

#3

sorry not sorry but murderbot dropping ‘i was going to kill all humans until i saw sanctuary moon and then i decided i’d rather watch that instead’ on the sanctuary moon team like a space future atom bomb is exquisite.

assistant sound director going home like ‘yeah your other son might be a doctor but guess who stopped a mass murder?’ a couple lead actors developing even worse diva/god complexes than they already had. the insane stress on the production team ‘if we don’t get the next season out when we promised it might snap and kill thousands of innocent people. it probably won’t. but it might.’ the overwhelming preening desire to work it into ad campaigns, acceptance speeches, casual brunches, etc, balanced out by marketing weeping ‘people do not like SecUnits! we can NOT advertise ourselves as the preferred serial for serial killers!’ crossed with that one extremely paranoid dude in accounting going ‘shutupshutup it can and will hear you and it can and will find you and it can and will kill you stoptalkingaboutit.’ the studio allocating a 5% budget increase for next season instead of the planned 5% budget decrease just—just in case. the odd relief the secondary love interest’s actor feels: ‘well when the robot revolution comes i’ll be one of the last to die’. the odd nervousness the primary antagonist actress feels: ‘it knows this is fiction right? it’s not mad at me, right?’ One of the writers who had been increasingly phoning it in over the last few years suddenly quitting drinking and turning their life around because their work has meaning dammit their work has MEANING.

1,898 notes - Posted February 7, 2022

#2

alright so people learn to express themselves through observation, right? it’s one of the reasons facial expressions and perception there of vary country to country, why people might end up more expressive/stoic depending on your parents/guardians pattern of behavior. and murderbot didn’t acculturate itself watching people around it, it hates watching real people. murderbot developed it’s sense of self watching soap operas. tens of thousands of hours of soap operas. We already know it’s face is painfully easy to read, and while murderbot attributes it to not having practice controlling it’s expression without the benefit of armor:

Then she added, “You know, you can stay here in the crew area if you want. Would you like that?” They all looked at me, most of them smiling. One disadvantage in wearing the armor is that I get used to opaquing the faceplate. I’m out of practice at controlling my expression. Right now I’m pretty sure it was somewhere in the region of stunned horror, or maybe appalled horror.  Mensah sat up, startled. She said hurriedly, “Or not, you know, whatever you like.”  I said, “I need to check the perimeter,” and managed to turn and leave the crew area in a totally normal way and not like I was fleeing from a bunch of giant hostiles.

I would argue that it’s not just lack of practice being neutral—due to it’s particular set of formative experiences, it’s default facial expressions are, in human terms, almost absurdly overexaggerarated. That look of horror is the same one the sanctuary moon terraforming supervisor had when she discovered her twin sister was sleeping with her second husband, and they were both planning on framing her for the death of the colony representative.

2,308 notes - Posted February 25, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

There is — god I don’t know how to put this — there is something profound and tragic and senseless in the fact that the disappointment I feel in JK Rowling so closely mirrors the disappointment Harry and the rest of us felt for his role models. Dumbledore saved the world, Dumbledore was manipulative. Snape was cruel, Snape protected Harry. The Marauders bullied, the Marauders loved. 

Rowling’s failure of empathy and the hurt she’s inflicting cuts so deep because I feel immense, inescapable love for the world she gave us all. How can I still love what comes from someone hateful? How can I stop? If I continue to sing praises of her art does that make me hateful?

Stories are important, especially the stories we’re told as children. They shape our character, they form the framework of how we understand the world, they do. And Harry Potter was the story, it can not be understated, and those of you who feel the same don’t need me to explain. And now when I lean on that to understand this sorrow I’m left with a recursive sort of remorse.

It’s a very raw and painful feeling.

3,052 notes - Posted January 1, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

[hellsbellschime]

Honestly, I think the issues with season 2 were twofold, the writers strike, and the budget cuts which resulted in the cut from 10 episodes to 8 (thank you WB's David Zaslav) The gullets was supposed to be in season one, the entire season was geared towards it, and then the episodes got cut and moved to season 3 and they had zero time to fix it in the writers room. The entire season just feels like it was left hanging. Rhaena is still in the wilderness trying to snag herself a dragon, everyone else is left marching... marching....marching....and perhaps running away (this is totally a fucking monty python sketch). It's such a disappointment, even though I was braced for it from about episode 4, and I realised the pacing was waaaaaay off.

Like it was SO oriented toward the Gullet that literally as the credits started rolling I actually thought the show was just doing an incredibly drawn-out montage of every character looking intensely before the battle began. I'm not like TV Nostradamus, but I am generally good at reading editing cues, and I think the only time I was genuinely shocked this season was when the show just ended after all of that buildup. David "no matter what I must increase profits by 1% for Q3" Zaslav sucks for a lot more than this, but god I really do feel bad for the writers given that they clearly wrote this season building up to something that they had to freaking CUT OUT at five minutes to midnight.

[kennedv]

early morning 7:12 am in the house kitchen with @niickvs !!

it both feels like too much time and not any time at all has passed since the last time kennedy was here, transplanted from her cozy apartment to a lavish mansion in a snowy wonderland. the budget has certainly increased though, something kennedy would have noticed even if she hadn't been privy to the numbers themselves. one sign is the much fancier expresso machine that sits on the counter of the large kitchen — she'd been getting okay at it in the last house, this newfangled machine though is proving rather frustrating. it's a relief when the next person to walk into the kitchen is nicky and not one of the camera crew — they're thankfully not here yet ( too early ) to capture her mediocre start to season 2. " nicky — thank god — " there's no mistaking the relief in her voice. " — do you know how to work this thing or should i give up and just make a pour over instead ?? "

[24hrsallnews]

Rolex Will Return In Kaithi 2?

Lokesh Cinematic Universe (LCU) is India's shared universe of action thriller films by filmmaker Lokesh Kanagaraj. Lokesh Cinematic Universe (LCU) film has done wonders in theaters and currently LCU related movie Leo is breaking all the records at the box office. Fans are excited to watch the film, waiting for the upcoming film Kaithi 2 under Lokesh Cinematic Universe (LCU). LCU's upcoming movies are Kaithi 2, Vikram 2, Leo 2. Kaithi 2 may be released in 2024 but it is not official yet.   Rolex Role in Vikram Suriya's Rolex avatar played a Cameo role in the film Vikram and was introduced in the final scene as the main villain of the series. Fans liked the role of Surya Rolex very much and the curiosity to see Rolex's character in LCU had increased. The main antagonist and boss of Sandhanam in Surya Vikram, portrayed by Vijay Sethupathi. Suriya will be seen in the Rolex spin-off and will play the role of Rolex in the upcoming film series. Rolex Film comes under LCU and LCU is a franchise consisting of multiple films, and one of them will be a spin-off focusing on the character played by Suriya. Vikram's film had a box office collection of up to ₹500 crore and was a blockbuster. Fans are eagerly waiting for the role of Rolex. Vikram (2019), Kaithi (2022) movies are released under Lokesh Cinematic Universe (LCU) and both movies were blockbuster movies. The Leo that is going on right now is breaking all records. Amar is from Kerala, Delhi is in Uttar Pradesh, Rolex is in Mumbai, Leo belongs to Himachal Pradesh. Leo director Lokesh Kanagaraj, has said that all the films will definitely have a connection with each other. He may direct a film exclusively on the Rolex character played by Suriya and fans loved his role. Rolex's Role got a positive support.   Making a sequel to Kaithi is also certain and Suriya had also said in one of his interviews that the character of Rolex can be seen in the future. We hope we get to see an epic clash of Rolex and dilli in Kaithi 2 but there is no official confirmation yet. Kaithi 4 years ago Dream Warrior Pictures had given information about Kaithi 2 on social media. Kaithi was released on 25 October 2019. At the end of the video it was written that, "Dilli will return". Dream Warrior Pictures tweet, "We thank and love you all for making #Kaithi very special and memorable ♥️🙏 #4YearsOfKaithi Here’s #KaithiBTS Hold your expectations for lifetime settlement #Kaithi2".   Read More - Scam 2003: The Telgi Story Teaser, release date, Star-cast, and Update - Which Ott platform does Gadar 2 release? - The first female spy of YRF Spy Universe - Mission Raniganj Box Office Collection Worldwide - Love, Death, and Horror: 1920 Horrors of the Heart - Best Comedy South Indian Movies Dubbed in Hindi list - Kushi movie review, Reaction and box office collection - Salaar and Dunki to release on 22 December 2023 - Welcome to the jungle story, cast and update - Leo Hindi Poster has been released today - Ram Pothineni starrer Skanda movie cast, budget and Box office collection Prediction - Unleashing the Ultimate Battle: Skanda vs Chandramukhi 2 - Brace Yourself for the Clash of masterpiece! - Loki Season 2 Release date and time, Our favorite God of Mischief returns - Will there be Leo 2? Read the full article

[simeon-takes-a-break]

Not everything will kill you in Australia - but it goddamn tries to - Part 2

Melbourne is a charming city with an amazing European-esque vibe and temperatures as volatile as Bitcoin’s price recently (I wrote this in 2017, my 2022 version is screaming internally). Here my bank buddy and I were planning a fabulous road trip along the famous Great Ocean Road with a stylish convertible while the temperatures were as low as back in Zurich. Also, we were horrified to realize that there was not a single convertible car available for rent for our great adventure, which was scheduled to commence the next day. Who would’ve thought that we were supposed to reserve a car a bit ahead of time? I however managed to dig up one rental car company specialized in luxury sports cars that had one car left. A Mercedes SLK350. For a mere 1’400 bucks the sexy biest could be ours. That and the insignificant security bond of 4’000 Aussie dollars. I was so fixated on this convertible idea that I blended any red flags out and made the reservation over the phone. The next day I signed the paperwork and picked up the car, which actually existed.

We’re off to a good start, or so I thought. 

Driving this powerful baby along this iconic road was really something. Never mind the ghastly cold wind. Breathtaking scenery for 300 kilometres. In no time we reached the Twelve Apostles (actually there are only 8 stacks left), took the obligatory photos and were ready to drive to our accommodation for the first night. My buddy had chosen an eco-friendly farm with 2 guest rooms in the middle of nowhere which was more remote than the current location of the Curiosity Rover on freaking Mars. I’m serious. Gmaps didn’t find it, and neither did the car’s GPS. So we had to call the landlords and ask for directions which were something like this: turn right after the weird-looking tree, 3km after the blue mailbox at the so-and-so street. Very helpful. At some point the asphalt road became a narrow gravel path. Perfect for a goddamn expensive sports car with a suspension so lowered you could slice an atom in half. Did I also mention that non-paved roads were off limits according to the rental contract? There was no turning back as dusk was starting to fall and on top of that, obviously, we had lost any cell phone signal by now. Did I unknowingly sign up for a new season of “The Simple Life”?

I drove at glacial speed while I mentally deducted 10 Aussie dollars from the ridiculous security bond each time I heard a rattling beneath us. Just before midnight we finally reached the place narrowly avoiding a nervous breakdown. We missed dinner and the chance to soak up the remoteness but the room was very cozy, which is nice. 

The next day my buddy revealed to me he wanted to cancel the road trip and return to Melbourne. After just one day. The tension between us had significantly increased so it didn’t come as a complete surprise. I was still freaking angry and disappointed but eventually gave in. Some things are just not meant to be. So we packed our things headed straight back to the city.

I highly recommend traveling with people who are more or less on the same page when it comes to budget and activities. I still remember feeling so uncomfortable. There was always the feeling of inequality, a sense of indebtedness somehow, basically not being the master of one’s own fate. And I didn’t like it. And neither did he. Obviously. 

Back in Melbourne I returned the car but not before every scratch on the front bumper was properly registered. Thank god everything else was intact. I was told that the damage needed to be accurately estimated and I’d get back the difference on my credit card within two weeks tops. Little did I know that the whole thing would turn into a nightmare. Fifty (not kidding) emails and half a year later, long after I returned to Switzerland, I finally got my money back - from my amazing and precious travel insurance. But not before my credit card was charged another AUD 2’800 from this insane mafia company. Had to immediately block my card. Those inbred sons of %*ç#@! After some googling I found out that not returning the bond was their usual business practice. There were many other exploited customers and the company had re-named itself numerous times to whitewash their ongoing sins. Karma will take care of them one day! 

My buddy decided to fly back to Sydney while I stayed in Melbourne and that was it. It was time to get back on track and shake off the unpleasant episode. I crashed the couch of Michael, whom I got to know in 2008 while he was backpacking in Europe. The next couple of days I explored Melbourne on my own. How liberating. Boy has the city a lot to offer. For instance the city’s Luna Park, right by the beach with its main attraction, a very bumpy, very expensive 11 dollar ride on the oldest continuously running roller coaster worldwide, built in 1912 and one of the only three coasters in the world where a brakeman is needed to stand in the middle of the train during the ride. Well, a breakwoman in my case, a slightly corpulent one, as well. Her face radiated sheer boredom while operating the moving vehicle, giving the whole situation a delightful comical touch. 

Since the exhibition “Melbourne Now” was on, the whole city was sprinkled with art installations and cultural performances. I noticed a street artist drawing beautiful sketches and started talking to her. The next day we met for a walk through the delightful botanical gardens where we sat for ages chitchatting away. The picturesque romance was disturbed by the worst street singer in the universe. Not only did he perform the same annoying and awkward five songs he had in his repertoire, he was also spectacularly off-key, too. A gave him a dollar to stop. Maybe this was his business idea. 

There was also the annual Midsumma Festival celebrating LGBTQI+ culture (they keep on adding letters to the acronym - soon it’ll be faster to just recite the alphabet) where I wandered alone in the striking heat buying disgusting overpriced premixed drinks and eventually settling for good old wine.

BTW I detest watching sports (stereotype check!) but when King Roger is playing at the Australian Open then there’s no excuse. How were there still tickets available? It was incredible to see him playing against the Australian James “Ducky” Duckworth. The audience was cheering for their countryman but at the same time showing massive respect to the maestro. While they played in the glistening sun, my weather app was indicating a merciless 43°C. Meanwhile I was very much focusing on not fainting, sitting in my chair in the shade. How the hell they managed to play remains a mystery to me.

Enough already with civilization. Time for the real outback. I booked the flight to Alice Springs in the heart of Australia and embarked on a 4’000km long 10 day red centre & top end crocodile rock adventure safari. 

***************

Side note: It’s been over 4 years since I’ve posted on this blog and most of what’s about to come from my first world trip is a blurry memory sprinkled with some notes I cleverly had saved on my phone and are still around (yay, organized me). Why I’m finally coming back to finish the memoir after all these years, you might ask. Well, it’s been almost 9 years since the trip has ended. I found a great job, had the chance to further my career and save some money and here we are; 2022 - call it catch up after COVID, midlife crisis, victim of the great resignation or nostalgia. Instead of “quiet quitting” which is en vogue among Gen Z, I actually handed in my resignation letter earlier this year after a long time of battling with the pros and cons of such a step. Oh boy was it harder than a decade ago. Almost everyone around you has somewhat settled and has a clear path in front of them. Whereas I am going in the opposite direction. Giving up one’s career, or at least interrupting it, and with it a steady income is no walk in the park. The last couple of weeks were much more stressful than I anticipated. It’s insane how cumbersome it is to untangle an everyday life of a 39 year old millenial in Zurich. I had planned to enjoy Switzerland in summer for the two weeks between my last day at work and the beginning of the trip. None of that I was able to do. Up to the very last day I was running around and organizing things. 

One pain in the freaking a** was the eye laser surgery I decided to undergo. I mean, that’s a great investment and a huge benefit when it comes to traveling. Or so I thought. First of all, the clinic I went to (at the recommendation of several acquaintances by the way) turned out to be a Greek microcosmos. I could understand just about half of what the Hellenic doctors were mumbling; at best. In addition to their vague and imprecise explanations. Didn't boost my confidence. Anyhow, I decided to go ahead with the procedure as the machine is doing all the work, right? Second, at the ripe age of 39 one is advised to do undercorrect the “non-dominating” eye resulting in a so called “monovision” so that - once presbyopia kicks in - that eye can still decipher a text on the iPhone without having to set up the letter size to pensioner mode. Well, the actual surgery went super smoothly but on day 4 I woke up with a stabbing pain in my left eye. Diagnosis: beginning of an eye infection just after I had completed the cumbersome eye drop routine. The antibiotics solved that but prolonged my healing process from what was supposed to be 3 weeks to what is 4 months by now, with weekly medical checks. My family scared me into getting a second opinion. The (very) Swiss doctor there bitched super hard about the eye tavern. His behavior was far from professional, but at least he told me that it’s unfortunate but nothing to be scared about. One needs just more patience. So, having left Switzerland, my final check with the Greek eye bazar shall be upon my return. Alas! 

Yet, here I am, I’m doing it again baby. Simeon’s taking a break, again. Again? Again. At this age? Hell, yes! But first things first. Let’s wrap my last trip up, shall we?

*********************

Compared to the scorching heat in Melbourne, Alice Springs was surprisingly cold and rainy. Not what one would expect from a town in the middle of Australia during midsummer. And so I stayed at the hostel and watched Stan the Man win against Novak - Covid doesn’t exist - Djokovic at the quarter final of the Australian Open, Stan later went on winning the tournament and sure enough I bumped into him at Universal Studios in LA a couple of weeks later. He was kind enough to have his bodyguard take a pic of us. 

The following day I arranged a date with a friendly bus driver on Grindr who suggested visiting some natural pools a mere stone’s throw from town, which I happily agreed to. That distance turned out to be a 100km drive without cell phone reception nor other people whatsoever. Luckily I wasn’t trapped in some cheap Hollywood horror B-movie. He was super friendly and showed me around.

And then it was finally time to hit the road. The ten days were packed with spectacular sights, experiences and helluva lot of mileage. I remember spending my birthday camping right next to the famous Uluru rock (which we declined to climb out of respect / or lack of physical fitness). We slept in swags under the open sky on the ground while every goddamn insect seemed to move or fly around us. As it had rained a couple of days ago nature went batshit crazy and every single animal had started to mate, breed, hatch, fly, crawl, eat or be eaten. Scorpions, rhino beetles, spiders, ginormous centipedes and most of all flying termites. Millions of them. It was like an invasion, or the plague.

To make matters worse there was no alcohol and bedtime was 10pm. What a birthday. At least they sang to me the birthday song while the sun was setting next to “The Rock”. Its bigger brother Kata Tjuta was actually more impressive, something straight out of a Jurassic Park movie.

Further north we stayed the night near a natural waterhole, where we would dare a night swim. The walk alone was an adventure in itself as we passed countless toads, frogs, crabs and surely yet to be discovered species. Jumping into the pitch black water took some courage (no artificial lights anywhere) but was rewarded with a spectacular night sky. 

The closest I felt to being Lara Croft was at the Mataranka Thermal Pool and Rainbow Springs. Swimming in the crystal clear spring water amidst the lush forest was something I still remember to this day. Purely magical and not to be missed. 

Before arriving in Darwin, we got to explore the mighty Kakadu national park, Australia’s largest national park covering an area half the size of Switzerland. There we were able to admire huge saltwater crocodiles up close (a couple of days later we read in the news that a 12 year boy was eaten by one of them), swim under impressive waterfalls and witness a helicopter landing for a casual quick shopping stop, and almost walk into a giant spider and its web.

At the campsite I also witnessed a major Simpsons moment as the whole area was infested with countless fugly cane toads, an invasive species. They are too deadly even for Australian standards, have no natural predators and eat each other. Charming. To make matters worse I barely couldn’t get sleep due to my tent buddy’s respiratory malfunctions (i.e. snoring). The next morning I decided to address this sensitive issue only to be confronted with the fact that I was apparently snoring, too. Eh, tit for tat!

Enough with the endless road trips and crazy wildlife. What I needed was the promise of pristine turquoise waters, white sandy beaches, tasty cocktails and an opportunity to consume “earth’s finest water” without a bad conscience (let’s conveniently neglect my flight to reach that promised land). Bula, Fiji!

[zerochanges]

2020 Favorite Video Games

I don’t know if I am an outlier or if this is the same for everyone else but I really did not play a lot of games this year. 2020 was a very harsh year for all of us, especially for me for some personal reasons. So to get to the chase, I am just gonna say it left me not doing much in what little free time I did have, and I didn’t play much either. Usually I try to keep my lists for ‘favorite of the year’ to only titles released that year but since I played so little this year, screw it. I am gonna include any game I played this year regardless of release date.

Collection of SaGa

By far a flawed rerelease. It’s bare bones: there are no advance features you would usually expect out of these kinds of emulated rereleases like save states, fast forward, or rewind, and there was no real effort made to touch up almost 30 year old localizations that had to meet Nintendo of America’s then harsh standards. This really is just 3 roms slapped into a nice looking interface with an option to increase the game speed (which by the way you better use, the characters walk very slow in these old games). 

I am bit harsh here, but only because I thought the Romancing SaGa remasters and the upcoming SaGa Frontier remaster all looked like they got a great budget and a lot of love while this is just another Collection of Mana situation (moreso specifically talking about Seiken Densetsu 1/Final Fantasy Adventure/Adventures of Mana part of that collection). I would have loved to see Square Enix do a bit more for these older games. Or at least include the remakes. Seiken Densetsu 1 had two great remakes, both unused in Collection of Mana, and all three of these original SaGa titles have remakes that have never seen the light of day outside of Japan. How great would it have been to get the Wonderswan remake of SaGa 1, as well as the Nintendo DS remakes of Saga 2 and SaGa 3? 

But my gripes aside, these games are still fun as they ever were. Replaying SaGa 1 specifically during the holiday season really helped calm me down and made me feel at ease. It’s easy to forget but even in their Gameboy roots there are a lot of funky and weird experimental choices being made in these games. They aren’t your run-of-the-mil dragon quest (or considering the gameboy, maybe pokemon would be more apt) clones. 

Raging Loop

Perhaps my favorite game of the year, Raging Loop is one of the best visual novels I have ever played hands down. The level of creativity and splitting story paths that went into it is simply mind blowing. The basic premise is both a wonderful throwback to the old days of Chunsoft sound novels while still modern and somewhat reminiscent of both Higurashi and Danganronpa. Essentially you play as Haruaki, a poor slub that got lost in the mountains with no clue where to go until you stumble upon an old rural village with a strange history and even stranger superstitions. Before you know it there has been a murder and the Feast is now afoot.

The less said about Raging Loop the better, although I do want to say a lot about it one day if I ever can write a proper review of it. This is a gripping game that will take hold of you once you get into it though and never let go. I actually 100%-ed this and I very rarely do that. I got every ending, every bonus hidden ending, played the entire game twice to hear all the hidden details it purposely hides on your first play through, played all the bonus epilogue chapters, unlocked all the hidden voice actor interviews, collected all the art work, etc, etc. I was just obsessed with this game, it’s that damn good! And the main character is maybe the best troll in all of video games, god bless Haruaki. 

Root Double

From Takumi Nakazawa, long time contributor to Kotaro Uchikoshi’s work comes a game any fan of Zero Escape or Uchikoshi in general will probably enjoy. Root Double, like its name suggests is a visual novel with two different routes, hence Root Double. The first route stars Watase Kasasagi, the leader of an elite rescue team in the midst of their greatest crisis yet that could lead to nuclear devastation as they try to evacuate a nuclear research facility that has gone awry. 

The other route stars Natsuhiko Tenkawa, an everyday high schooler whose peaceful life is thrown into turmoil when he stumbles upon a terrorist plot to destroy the nuclear facility in the city and his attempts to stop them. Together the two separate plots weave into one and creates a really crazy ride. Part Chernobyl, part science fiction, any fan of the genre will easily enjoy it. And hey it’s kind of relevant to include on this list too since it just got a Switch port this year (I played it on steam though).  

Snack World

I was shocked upon starting Snack World as it is instantly incredibly charming, witty, and downright hilarious at times yet I heard almost zero people talk about it. EVER. This game is Dragon Quest levels of quirky though, and the localization is incredible. The game has such an oddball sense of humor that works really well with its presentation right down to the anime opening video that sings about the most bizarre things. Instead of the usual pump up song about the cool adventure ahead we get stuff like wanting to go out to a restaurant and eat pork chops. 

The self aware/fourth wall breaking humor is just enough to be really funny, but doesn't overstay its welcome and always makes it work right in the context of the dialogue. And finally, just everything; with the menus, the name of side quests and missions, and the character dialogue -- are all just so witty and full of quirky humor. This is one hell of a charming and funny game and addictive to boot.

Trials of Mana

Trials of Mana has gone from one of those legendary unlocalized games, to one of the first major breakthroughs in fan translation, to finally getting an official English release complete with a fully 3D remake. In a lot of ways from a western perspective this game has had an incredible journey. As for this remake itself, I really found myself having tons of fun with it. I loved the graphics, and the voice acting while a bit on the cheaper side almost kind of adds to the charm since both the graphics and acting really give it an old PS2 vibe. I know that is probably just more me being weird but yeah, I had to say it. 

I really hope Square Enix sticks to this style of remake more often, instead of just doing Final Fantasy VII Remakes that break the bank and involve extensive tweaking to both plot and game play. I’ll take smaller budget projects that play more like the original game any day personally. I wouldn’t mind if they also deliver a brand new Mana game all together in this engine either. 

Utawarerumono Trilogy

This year saw the release of the first entry in the series, Utawarerumono: Prelude to the Fallen--and thus finally after three years since the sequels Utawarerumono: Mask of Deception and Utawarerumono: Mask of Truth came out in 2017 the trilogy is now complete in English. I ended up binging through Prelude to the Fallen very fast shortly after it came out and immediately jumped on to the sequels. Perhaps the best part of 2020 was that I finally played all three of these fantastic games, and did so back-to-back-to-back. Playing the first Utawarerumono was an experience I will never forget, it was like visiting old friends again that I haven’t seen in ages, by and large thanks to the fact that I saw the anime adaption of the game when I was much younger, nearly a decade ago. Back then I would have never of dreamed that I would get to play the actual game and get the real experience. 

And it only got better from here, as all three games are such wonderful experiences from start to finish. The stories are all so deep, and by the time you get to the third entry, Mask of Truth, it’s crazy to see how they all connected over so many years and weaved together into a plot much bigger than they ever were. What carries it beyond all that though has to be the fun and addicting strategy role playing game aspect, which while a bit on the easy side, is still so much fun and helps make the game feel better paced since you get to play the conquests your characters go on and not just read about all the battles they fight. Beyond that the games are packed full of awesome characters, and I know I’ll never forget the amazing leads in all of them. Hakuowlo, Haku, and Oshtor will all go down as some of the greats to me. 

Ys: Memories of Celceta

Ys: Memories of Celceta is a full 3D remake of Ys IV, a rather infamous game in Falcom’s Ys series. Not to get bogged down too much into the history of Falcom but by this point they were facing a lot of hardship and had to outsource this entry to other developers, and thus passed it on to two particular developers they had a business relationship with, creating two unique versions of Ys IV. Tonkin House who had worked on Super Famicom port of Ys III with Falcom ended up creating their own YS IV entry, Mask of the Sun for the very same system, where Hudson soft who had produced the much beloved Ys Books I & II remakes for the Turbografix (PC Engine) CD add-on created their own Ys IV entry Dawn of Ys for that console. Both games followed guidelines and ideas outlined from Falcom themselves but both radically diverged from each other and turned into completely different games. 

Falcom finally putting an end to this debate on which version of Ys IV you should play have gone and created their own definitive Ys IV in 2012 for the Playstation Vita. I played the 2020 remastered version of this remake on my PS4. I even bought this on the Vita when it first came out but I am horrible and only horde games, never play them. So it was a lot of fun to finally play this. 

Memories of Celceta is probably one of the best starting points for anyone looking to get into Ys, especially if you only want to stay with the 3D titles as out of all the 3D entries this explains the most about the world and series protagonist Adol Christian. Beyond that it’s just another fantastic entry in a wonderful series that has a few good twists hidden behind it, especially for long time fans of the series. 

Random Video Game Console Stuff

Xbox Has Blue Dragon: I actually got an Xbox One this year for free from my brother. Because of that I started to play Blue Dragon again and there’s a lot I would love to say about this game. I don’t know if I am fully committed to replaying it all the way through however but I find myself putting in a couple hours every few days and enjoying myself again. Does anyone else remember Blue Dragon? I feel like it really missed its audience and had it come out nowadays and probably for the Switch it would have really resonated with the Dragon Quest fandom a lot more instead of being thrown out to die on Xbox and constantly compared to Final Fantasy VII and the like which it had nothing at all similar with. 

The Turbografx 16 Mini: This was probably one of the best mini consoles that have come out and I feel like thanks to the whole 2020 pandemic thing it was largely forgotten about. That’s a shame, it has a wonderful variety of great games, especially if you count the Japanese ones (god I wish I could play the Japanese version of Snatcher included), and a wonderful interface with fantastic music. One of these days I would really like to be able to play around with the console more seriously than I have already. 

Fire Emblem Shadow Dragon Never Existed: So Nintendo localized the first ever Fire Emblem game on Nintendo Switch which is awesome to see them touching Famicom games again--I haven’t seen Nintendo of America rerelease old Famicom titles since Mysterious Murasame Castle on the 3DS, but their trailer hilariously made it seem like this is the first time ever they released Fire Emblem when in fact they had already localized the remake Shadow Dragon on the Nintendo DS nearly 10 or 11 years ago. I and many other fans I talked to all found this really hilarious, probably solely because of how much they kept repeating the fact that this is the first time you will ever be able to experience Marth’s story.

All that aside though I have to say the collector edition for this newly localized Famicom game is probably the most gorgeous retro reproduction I have seen in a long time, and I really spent many many hours just staring at the all clear glass mock cartridge. I have found myself really obsessing over retro reproductions during 2020, and obtained quite a few this year. I really hope this trend continues to go on in 2021 as recreating classic console packaging and cartridges is a lot of fun. 

[londonspirit]

Occasionally, Dan Levy will pick up his phone and send a text: “Can you believe it?” These messages are sent to Annie Murphy or Noah Reid or Emily Hampshire or Karen Robinson, former inhabitants of Schitt’s Creek, titular town of the series Levy co-created with his identically-browed father, Eugene. What Levy can’t quite believe is that a CBC and Pop network show that aired in the U.S. after reruns of The Young and the Restless became a no-shit international phenomenon and won every major 2020 comedy Emmy from Outstanding Series to Outstanding Contemporary Costumes, plus awards for the show’s four main cast members: Levy, Levy the elder, Murphy, and Catherine O’Hara.

Not that Levy has any qualms about the best thing that’s ever happened to him. Or, more accurately, the best thing he’s ever made happen: In addition to creating, writing, and starring as skeptical scion David Rose on Schitt's Creek, Levy occasionally directed episodes and sourced many of the award-winning costumes. But the endless wretchedness of 2020 is perhaps an inopportune time to publicly garner good fortune.

“What this year has done has opened so many people's eyes to so much of the social unrest that is happening in America and really forced people to learn more,” Levy says, sitting in the bland Toronto apartment the 37-year-old is temporarily renting until he can head back to LA. “Read more. Educate themselves more. Check their privilege more. And yet…” Levy’s magnificent eyebrows unfold from a furrow of probity to an arch of delight, and his mouth into a crooked tilde of a smile. “There are moments when I think it is important for your sense of self to also be OK to say, ‘Something good happened to me this year, and I worked really hard for it.’ And so did a group of really talented people that I love. You're kind of caught in this place where only you can talk about it amongst yourselves.” Levy’s conversations with his co-stars are couched in language familiar to anyone who doesn’t want to give off the vibe of an Instagram caption on a pandemic birthday trip to a private island: "Well, obviously, you know, this is not of much significance" compared to everything else that’s going on. Still, Levy has to acknowledge that, yes, a good thing did happen; after all, he says, “You're talking about breaking records at the Emmys!”

Since he began social distancing, Levy has engaged in something like a fame-offset program, matching his good fortune by taking, publicizing, and raising money for University of Alberta’s online Indigenous Canada course. Levy’s queasiness about his success happening with a 2020 backdrop seems to stem from goodness so pervasive he’s caught himself thinking, Am I going to seem too, like, sincere? (When I ask if he believes he’s a good person, Levy frets, “Is being a good person something you can proclaim? Or is being a good person something that someone has to observe about you?”)

And Schitt’s Creek itself is an oasis of kindness — it doesn’t seem coincidental that after a slow five-season ascent, the show’s viewership exploded in its final year as we quarantined with our own bad thoughts. Levy has said that the arc of the Rose family — a “Balenciaga” to “consignment Balenciaga” to “back to current season Balenciaga” story — is based on the question, “Would the Kardashians still be the Kardashians without their money?” To Levy, the answer is obvious: Yes, and they would be better for it because, he says, “There is a love to that family.” So of course when the Roses lose the fortune amassed from a video rental empire and are forced to move to a Canadian town purchased as a novelty gift, they learn what truly matters.

Levy’s father and collaborator, Eugene, who co-wrote Christopher Guest films Best In Show and A Mighty Wind, says, “There are people who work in the world of comedy where they like to push envelopes in terms of what they can get away with, but that may come at the expense of other people. If it's at all important to you to avoid then you, you know, avoid it.” With the notable exception of programs like The Great British Bake Off — Levy, naturally, used to host the Canadian iteration — it is quite a bit more difficult to be entertaining and kind than entertaining and cruel. But Dan Levy attributes some of Schitt’s Creek’s success to what he calls “a purity to the storytelling and the show that caught people off guard because it was so unexpectedly sincere.” “There was something badass about the fact that it didn't have the kind of edge that people had often equated with cable comedies,” he says.

Making Schitt’s Creek a source of goodness and light was an unrelenting crush for Levy. “How much anger and rage do I have to repress in order to get the light out?” he says, laughing and stroking his elderly dog, Redmond, so vigorously I worry about ginger fur getting on Levy’s David Rose-appropriate black and white JW Anderson T-shirt. “Um, at times a lot.”

When Levy was working on Schitt’s Creek, he was picked up every morning at 5 a.m. and driven to set, where he would rehearse and rewrite scenes. Next was making decisions about sets and wardrobe fittings for cast members like O’Hara. Moira Rose, the actor mother of Levy’s character with a grandeur as flamboyant as her choice of syllable emphasis, might have to go to meet someone who makes her feel exposed. Levy would supervise an outfit selection that functioned as a billboard for her emotional state. “How do you express vulnerability?” Levy asks. “Well, you put more clothes on, and more aggressive clothes on, so as to armor yourself.” Levy needed to approve budgets, which didn’t increase even as the show gained more attention. He would act and sometimes direct, and then be back in wardrobe picking out the right statement necklaces for O’Hara to wear to buy a used car.

After filming ended, Levy went to the writers’ room to work for a couple more hours. He’d get home at 8 p.m., quickly eat dinner, and write until 2 a.m. on some nights. Then he’d sleep for two hours and get in the car to go back to work at 5 a.m. When shooting wrapped for the year, Levy went into post-production, spending months in windowless rooms. Once a season was finally completed, preparation would begin for the next one. Levy charged himself with making sure every detail connected to each other and tracked with the personal histories he and Eugene had written for each character before the series began. Eugene can remember only one deviation from those bios during the entire run of the show. Originally, the father of motel employee Stevie had been a roadie for Fleetwood Mac before receiving a restraining order from the band; the detail was later transferred to the father of diner waitress Twyla, who was played by Levy’s sister, Sarah. Several times during the run of the series, Levy developed anxiety so literally paralyzing that his neck would seize up, forcing him to wear a brace and receive chiropractic treatments between scenes.

“Through every phase of Schitt's Creek,” Eugene says, “Dan had a very strong sense as to what it was he wanted the show to look like and what he wanted it to sound like and what the tone of the show was going to be and what the message of the show would be. He certainly makes himself responsible to make these things happen. He doesn't go with the flow at all.”

Total control let Levy create a perfectly realized world, from the menu size in the Café Tropical to the caws in Moira’s comeback film The Crows Have Eyes III: The Crowening. But it’s perhaps not the healthiest arrangement when the confines of quarantine feel normal to you. “Over the past six years,” Levy says, “I really haven't been outside that much.”

When he was a boy, Levy became so anxious that he did not want to attend birthday parties. He did not want to go to summer camp. He did not, in fact, want to engage in any social situations. Levy’s anxiety physically manifested as iritis, an inflammation of the eye which doctors feared would eventually take his vision. It was as if the anxiety that drove Levy indoors had then decided to draw all the curtains.

“I think that came from a deep-rooted fear of knowing that I was gay and not being able to be free,” Levy says now. “By the time I got to high school, when your brain is starting to catch up to your physical impulses, it led to a very confusing time. Because on the one hand, you are now being introduced to things like self-awareness and anxiety. At the same time, you’re becoming more and more savvy when it comes to hiding it.”

The escape was theater. Levy began writing, directing, and performing in school plays, including a student-run stage adaptation of Clue produced during a teacher’s strike. “I was starting to develop a sense of confidence by way of being able to entertain people,” Levy says. “It was like a decoy version of myself that I was putting out there to not have to live with the reality that when the bullying was happening — if someone was calling me a f----t or whatever it was — they were speaking the truth.” What a cursed blessing to discover you have a gift but to understand it as a distraction from who you really are and not as a true part of yourself. No wonder that Levy says of creating a persona — naturally, in the self-distancing second person — “Your sense of self gets chipped away. You lose sight of your own value.”

Levy had a ticker of fears scrolling through his mind broadcasting what might happen if people knew who he really was: “Fear of being ridiculed. Fear of being othered. Fear of exposing something that I think a lot of high school students at the time didn't have the tools to process properly, to make it comfortable for me.”

Then, when he was 18, Levy came out. Actually, his mother, Deborah Divine, invited Levy to come out, over lunch. Levy accepted, and was accepted in return. It was one version of an inflection point that Levy has explored in some of his most impactful work. In Happiest Season, Hulu’s lesbian Christmas rom-com, Levy delivers the film’s high point in a monologue; filmmaker Clea DuVall tells me, “I cried during every take.”

“Everybody’s story is different,” Levy’s John says to Kristen Stewart’s Abby, who is planning to propose to a woman whose family doesn’t know she’s queer. “But the one thing that all of those stories have in common is that moment right before you say those words, when your heart is racing and you don’t know what’s coming next,” John goes on. “That moment’s really terrifying. And then once you say those words, you can’t unsay them. A chapter has ended and a new one’s begun, and you have to be ready for that.”

On the Schitt’s Creek episode “Meet the Parents,” David’s future in-laws discover their son Patrick is gay before he can come out to them. “Did we do something wrong, David?” Patrick’s father asks, inadvertently head-faking homophobia before saying, “The thought that Patrick was feeling like he couldn't come and talk to us about this…”

Obviously not everyone who comes out gets the response they’re hoping for. But like Patrick, Levy had a happy ending sitting in front of him: accepting and caring parents wondering when their son was going to tell them he was gay and trying to respect his timeline for doing so. When I ask Eugene if it’s painful knowing that he could have potentially alleviated the anxiety Levy was feeling by approaching him sooner, he concurs. “I would have done things so much differently, you know?” Eugene says slowly. “I would have gotten more involved in talking about what was going on.” But he doesn’t know that it would have changed anything — after all, the flow goes with Levy. “Not necessarily that we would have gotten any direct answers,” Eugene says. “You can only get back what you get back.” (Levy confirms he was not ready to discuss his sexuality before he was; despite his parents’ openness and love, he had created Schrödinger’s Eugene and Deb in his head, simultaneously welcoming him and rejecting him at the news.)

Newly out, Levy went to college and began dating. However, he says, “I was not in any place to be of great value in a relationship.” Like David Rose, Levy’s pitch tends to ascend on the back half of sentences, making him sound like he’s interrogating his own thought process. “You then get into these habits where you're dating people who are totally wrong for you because they're seeking out people who are a bit damaged,” Levy says, “and you're seeking out people who have one foot out the door so that you don't actually give yourself over in any kind of way.” (After I mention that while watching Happiest Season, I wanted Stewart’s character to dump her semi-emotionally damaging girlfriend and leave with Levy, he says, “In this conversation, I'm brought back to many a relationship [where] ‘RUN’ was just, like, the subtitle flashing for about a year and a half of my life.”)

Dating, then, became another way to keep people out. “I really got to a point where I felt like if I didn't make an active choice to pull myself out of this shell that was becoming such a comfort,” Levy says, “I would not be the adult that I want to be.” He spent a summer in England, answering phones at the ICM talent agency as exposure therapy for speaking, unscripted, to strangers. A month and a half later, he auditioned to be a host on MTV Canada. Levy says it was “the ultimate exercise in pushing myself and getting myself out there. If I could get a job on television asking other people questions — which had previously been on the top five things that I would never want to do — this could be the final kind of exercise in changing myself for the better.”

Like Levy’s high school theater work, his success as a host was a gnarled little monkey’s paw of unfortunate wish fulfillment. He was charismatic on screen and became famous enough to travel to New York on the weekends and get into the clubs he wanted to get into. Levy also pioneered the now-prevalent televised after-show with his The Hills discussion series, which exists in the same tonal universe as Schitt’s Creek: sharp enough to make you feel smart for laughing at it, but warm enough that Lauren Conrad herself was a guest.

But much of the work felt limiting. The questions he had to ask celebrities were pre-negotiated with publicists and written by producers — as Levy notes, “No one wants to sit down with someone from MTV Canada and have a revelatory chat about life.” One of his last appearances before quitting was the MTV Movie Awards red carpet. “You could see a kind of judgment in the people you're interviewing,” he says. “They're not rolling their eyes, but you can feel them thinking about rolling their eyes. And I know that a lot of the times they were questions I didn't necessarily want to be asked if I were in that situation.” Pretending to be the version of himself he thought people would accept, Levy says, “kind of just didn't feel worth it anymore.”

You know the next part. Levy realized he could keep the traits people had responded to when he performed — his charisma, his humor — add sincerity, and still be compelling. He spent half a decade grinding out something that was truly of himself. And through Schitt’s Creek Levy became, his father points out, “one of the top showrunners in the entertainment business right now.” Eugene says, “After the [Emmys] broadcast I think there were probably some executives who — if they even remember us going in to pitch the show — are probably kicking themselves.”

Based on what he does next, Levy is now in the unique position of being able to calibrate how famous he becomes. It’s evening in Toronto, and Levy mulls the question over what simply cannot be good wine; when I ask what kind it is, he says, “Red?” Levy knows he could choose to stay behind the scenes and work on the ABC Studios projects he has in development. But Levy is also in the early stages of a romantic comedy he would star in. He worries that he wouldn’t be able to handle uber-fame with the aplomb his co-star Kristen Stewart does. When they went out to a dive bar while filming in Pittsburgh, he says, “I was just so kind of in awe of her confidence and comfort in herself. She's so at ease — [I say that] as someone who I think will always be on their journey to have that for myself.”

“Dan’s assessment is actually incorrect,” Stewart says later. “But what I have done is try to keep that experience [of fame] fairly insular, not make other people I’m with take on the weight of my own self-consciousness — or, God forbid, have someone think I’m up my own ass and loving the attention. It’s easier for me to pretend [people noticing me] is not happening, even though on the inside I still feel like the world is a big school yard of giggling onlookers. Are they laughing at me? Yes, no… Who cares.”

If Levy ever does find himself in the position of being Stewart-famous, she thinks he’ll be fine. “What I did notice was how absolutely wonderful Dan is with everyone,” she says. “He is so loving and gracious towards people that recognize him. The positive force he puts out into the world is clearly reflected in how people come back at him.”

What Levy is putting out into the world next: “I would like to date more,” he says, shoulders bashfully rising ceilingward. “Circumstance plays such a huge part in what we accept for ourselves. When you're doing something that you love it’s like, ‘I have a full plate.’ Even though [Schitt’s Creek was] super intense and even though at times I need a neck brace, it was never not inspiring, and it was never not thrilling and exciting and totally satisfying. So to [want to] make space for someone else…in a way, it is the ultimate filter. You’re basically saying, do I want to carve out the space in an already full and fulfilled life for this person? And a lot of the time, the answer is no. But it only makes it that much better when the right person comes along.”

For now, Levy’s plate is full of his multiple simultaneous projects. (He says there are more than three but few enough that you could count them on both hands, though he doesn’t want to talk about them in detail until there’s actually something to talk about — if Levy follows the Schitt’s Creek model, he jokes, he’ll “get five seasons on television before anybody sees them.”) Before he begins writing, Levy must make sure his entire house is immaculate. Even today, months after the series finale of Schitt’s Creek aired, Levy is negotiating the length of the “fuck”-blocking bleeps of syndication. But as we have all learned this year, not everything is under our control, even if we are Dan Levy. Stewart remembers him panicking as he tried to decorate a new home and realized none of the furniture he bought made any sense together. “The idea of him left and right showrunning and developing and acting and writing — and then his sweater closet confounding him — was very cute,” she says.

A certain amount of acceptance will be useful as Levy figures out how to follow up a beloved hit show. “The goal was to make sure that the first season was exactly what we wanted it to be,” Levy says of his Schitt’s Creek thought process. “To use the resources that we have as best as we can to get that season out there, so that we can go to sleep at night knowing that if people don't respond to it and it gets pulled off the air, there was nothing more we could have done.” Levy leans forward with a sincerity he’d surely second-guess if he were writing this scene and explains the daunting task of living up to yourself. “That’s the goal of anything I'm gonna do from here on out. It's just, try and do the best job you can. Try to make sure that you're loving it.”

[stuckwith-harry]

WHAT'S THAT CURRY RECIPE IT SOUNDS GOOD!!

MATE IT’S SO EASY LET’S GO

you’ll be needing: exactly uno (1) pot because we’re crafty and we don’t like doing DISHES; onion, garlic, bunch o’ veggies; tomato paste (or sundried tomatoes if you’re fancy); olive oil; can o’ coconut milk; dried lentils; spices (salt, pepper, whatever herbs you fancy, curry spice)

i eyeballed the whole entire thing so i have zero exact measurements you just gotta feel it in your heart. or watch a couple youtube videos to get an idea of how much of everything you need. where do u think i learned this anyway

💚 chop up some onion n put that in the pot with some olive oil and a bit of garlic (i used garlic powder but fresh is obviously fancier)

💚 add a good ol’ squeeze of tomato paste (this is gonna give the whole thing a nice red-ish colour and some taste) OR, if you’re fancy, chop up some sun-dried tomatoes. they come in a jar and i think i’ll be using those in the future because i LOVE sun-dried tomatoes !!!! i think they’d work spectacularly here. they’re just a bit pricier and we’re on a hashtag student budget hehe

💚 chop up whatever veggies you fancy and put those in the pot as well! i had mushrooms i needed to use up so mushrooms it was but anything would work. i’m a sweet potato stan and they’d definitely work here. season w salt n pepper n a generous amount of curry spice!

💚 put the lid on, stir occasionally, wait ‘til soft. if anything’s burning at the bottom of the pot, add a tiny lil splash of earth juice aka good ol’ h2o

💚 once that’s nice n hot and soft, pour in the coconut milk and some water (i’d say about 2 parts water for 1 part coconut milk but you can be generous! it’s gonna look like soup in the beginning and it’s gonna feel too much but it’s fine i promise. the lentils r about to come through)

💚 rinse & add the lentils! remember their volume is gonna increase as they cook & soak up the liquid so it’s still gonna look like soup. it’s probably fine!

💚 bring up to a boil and then bring down the heat. we’re talking low to medium heat. put the lid on, check on it occasionally, and just let it do its thing for about 45 minutes or until the lentils are nice and soft and you’ve got a stew-like consistency rather than straight up soup. again: feel it in your heart

💚 season to taste. right now it’ll still be reasonable mild so if you like your food to go hard, add some paprika or chili flakes on top. would look fancier too! if you did too much, stir in some more coconut milk

💚 enjoy ! i ate mine with a side of rice & some salad last time but in hindsight i’d totally opt for naan. we love dipping !!! and naan is fluffy and delicious !!! i’d sell my soul for some good bread and naan is god fucking tier

thank you for allowing me to release my inner cooking show host anon! if you end up making it i take zero responsiblity (but i’d love to hear how it went hehe)

[theonyxpath]

Now available: Tales of Good Dogs for Realms of Pugmire! Now in eBook and print-on-demand from DriveThruFiction.

Be a good dog. Protect your home. Be loyal to those who are true. These are the words of the Code of Man.

– Sister Picassa Collie, Shepherd of the Church of Man

Dogs have inherited the world, building the kingdom of Pugmire untold centuries after the Ages of Man are over. These dogs have been uplifted to use tools and language, and they seek to rediscover the ruins of the Old Ones.

Some have learned to use the leftover technology of humanity, but they believe it to be magic handed to them by their lost gods. Others seek to create an ideal civilization, using a Code of Man compiled from ancient, fragmentary lore left behind by humanity.

The world is dangerous and mysterious, but over the course of these 18 stories, good dogs will persevere.

Also available: Tales of Excellent Cats

Sales

Scarred Lands products for Pathfinder (the Scarred Lands Players Guide and The Wise & The Wicked 2nd Edition) are upwards of 90% off from Indie Press Revolution! Both products are an incredible $5 each!

Kickstarter Update

The Kickstarter for Cults of the Blood Gods for Vampire: The Masquerade 5th Edition started last week. After hitting its $25,000 funding goal in just 47 minutes (and doubling it in under 10 hours), we currently at $108,478, or 362%. Thanks to our 1802 backers! We hit the following stretch goals:

Trail of Bone and Ashes: The Ties That Bind, a playable Hecata story; Old Wounds, exploring the enmity between the Cappadocians, Lamiae, Giovanni, Samedi, and Harbingers; Open Your Eyes: an examination of Golconda; The Wellspring: wherein the coterie take over an abandoned cult

Blood Gods Backer T-Shirt

Blood Gods Desktop Wallpaper

Forbidden Paths: Pathways to Power: cults dedicated to power through fear, influence, or devotion, including worshipers of the Nictuku, errant houses within the Tremere, and the ancestral obsession of the Ventrue. Dreams of Golconda: A number of cults who believe they alone know the path to Golconda.

Art budget increase!

Did you miss one of our previous Kickstarters? The following Kickstarted products are still open for preorders via BackerKit:

Scarred Lands: Creature Collection 5e

They Came from Beneath the Sea!: They Came from Beneath the Sea! rulebook

Trinity Continuum: Trinity Continuum: Aberrant

Dystopia Rising: Evolution: Dystopia Rising: Evolution rulebook

Realms of Pugmire: Pirates of Pugmire

Exalted: Lunars: Fangs at the Gate

Chronicles of Darkness: Chronicles of Darkness: Dark Eras 2

Chronicles of Darkness: The Contagion Chronicle

Geist: The Sin-Eaters: Geist: The Sin-Eaters 2nd Edition

Community Spotlight

The following community-created content for Scarred Lands has been added to the Slarecian Vault in the last week:

Your product could be here! Have you considered creating your own to sell?

The following community-created content for Realms of Pugmire has been added to Canis Minor in the last week:

Your product could be here! Have you considered creating your own to sell?

The Storypath Nexus is now open! So far Scion content has been unlocked. The following community-created content for Scion has been added to the Storypath Nexus in the last week:

Scion: Athens, Ohio: Season 1

Your product could be here! Have you considered creating your own to sell?

[edh-a-to-z]

17 - Anax and Cymede

LORE:

Go tell the Spartans. It’s time to abuse the Heroic mechanic.

Anax and Cymede are the King and Queen of Akroas, AKA Theros version of Sparta. Except with less slavery and more noble warrior stuff.

From here:

Anax is a burly man in his late 40s, once a follower of Iroas. In his later years he has turned to Purphoros as he steers his people through the creation of a small empire. This shift is reflected in the trend in art now seen from Akroan artisans. Swords and armor are now decorated. Pottery, clothing, wall paintings, and weaving show ancient Akroan patterns and symbolism handed down for generations. To his people, Anax is a great leader to be followed without question. To other poleis, he is known as a skilled tactician and heartless killer.

Cymede worships Keranos primarily. She is a skilled warrior but a more powerful seer. Having herself been struck by lightning and given a glimpse of the future, Cymede is seen by some as being partly responsible for her husband's effectiveness as king. Cymede is beginning to become aware of the power of godly creatures such as nymphs. She has seen abstract glimpses of their power and feels the gods are bestowing gifts on the faithful. Because of this, the cult of Keranos is gaining a foothold in the Kolophon. Cymede has even had a special temple built on a distant mountain summit where the storms are particularly severe. During the storm season, she visits there, meditating on a silver platform.

THE CARD:

Though it takes a bit jumping through a hoop, Anax and Cymede offer something rather rare in Boros colors - Trample. 

The card is also pretty solid for a 3 drop - First Strike and Vigilance are great on a 3/2 three drop, and the aforementioned buff will be how we win.

BUILDS:

We want to abuse Anax and Cymede’s Heroic ability. For that, we need combat tricks, Auras that can be cast multiple times, and the ability to go wide. And we need them to stay alive. 

Luckily, we’re in Boros colors. We have plenty of cheap and effective combat tricks and auras that we couldn’t use elsewhere. We’ll have plenty of tokens, and we’ll use an equipment fetching tech to keep out commander alive.

This deck is also super budget. The basic version can be done for under $100 (probably lower, but I’m not in the mood for math), and can be easily upgraded.

BATTLE PLAN:

We want things that work like Heroic (Anax and Cymede plus the best of the Heroic cards).

Then we want things that target - multi targeting cards with Strive, Enchantments that can bounce to hand and target again, anything to activate heroic. Then, we need to make use of A&C’s ability - we need to go wide. Lots and lots of tokens to throw at the enemy, that get buffed and have trample.

Akroan Crusader, by Johann Bodin

First we want Akroan Crusader, Akroan Conscriptor, Akroan Line-Breaker, Dawnbringer Charioteers, Fabled Hero, Favored Hoplite, Hero of Iroas, Leonin Iconoclast, Phalanx Leader, Tethmos High Priest, and Vanguard of Brimaz are all great Heroic choices (most of the remaining just have some +1/+1 counter syngery, which is a little underwhelming).

We also want Mirrorwing Dragon and Zada, Hedron Grinder. We cast battle tricks and buffs on them, and they copy it for the whole team. 

EDIT: Whoops! Looks like I got that wrong, the copies Mirrorwing and Zada make won’t trigger Heroic for your whole team, as Heroic works on a casting trigger, not just being the target. They’re still amazing cards to play with since we’re running this many combat tricks, so try them out! Thanks for the catch, @imadrewid!

For spells we want two groups: reusable enchantments, and combat tricks that can target multiple creatures (alternatively, you can just do single targets with the desire to hit Anax and Cymede and nothing else).

I wish this card wasn’t 10 dollars. - R Angelic Destiny, by Jana Schirmer & Johannes Voss

Conviction, Crown of Flames, Flickering Ward, Ghitu Firebreathing, Mark of Fury, and Sun Clasp are all enchantments that can be cast more than once. They’re all super cheap, and if you have more money to burn, there’s Angelic Destiny and Eldrazi Conscription.

Next, we have the instants and sorceries. We want the best of the Strive cards, plus some fun combat tricks, preferably ones that replace themselves or hit multiple targets.

Ajani’s Presence, Desperate Stand, Launch the Fleet, Phalanx Formation, Rouse the Mob, and Twinflame are some of my favorite instants. Check here for some more ideas.

C’mon guys, we’re almost at Arbys! Launch the Fleet, by Karl Kopinski

Finally, we need an army. Any token generators, especially ones that make multiples or can do it repeatedly, are great choices. We already have Akroan Crusader and Vanguard of Brimaaz, and there’s Assemble the Legion, Hanweir Garrison (don’t forget Hanweir Battlements too!), Captain of the Watch, Hero of Bladehold, Monastery Mentor, and Sram’s Expertise. There are more, but these are my favorites.

THE REST:

If the deck has one weakness, it’s the Boros color’s aggro - weak draw. We can make up for this with a few cards.

We also want to protect Anax and Cymede - our deck is really designed around them not dying. So a basic equipment package is our go-to, so check this out here. Plus, anything that adds hexproof or indestructible are great choices. The Kaldra trio, Darksteel Plate, Mask of Avacyn, Swiftfoor Boots are great equipment.

On the enchantment side of things, try Shielded by Faith, Unquestioned Authority, Indestructible, Spirit Mantle, and Holy Mantle - a mix of Protection from Creatures and Indestructible works great on the battlefield. Add some enchantment tutors to speed things up.

“Alright peasants, this is a sword. Hold it like this” - Mentor Mentor of the Meek, by Jana Schirmer & Johannes Voss

We can draw with the White classic of Mentor of the Meek (given all the tokens we’ll be making). Plus Sram, Senior Artificer works great with our auras that jump around. Also to consider - Mesa Enchantress and Kore Spiritdancer for more draw.

There’s also spell doublers. Chandra, the Firebrand, Dual Casting, Primal Amulet/Wellspring do it on the cheap, and Dualcaster Mage, Fork, Reverberate, Howl of the Horde, Increasing Vengeace are more doublers, but need mana to fire off to make copies. Extra copies is extra heroic triggers. May or may not work with the deck.

There’s always classic Boros Legendaries like Aurelia, Blade of the Legion, Iroas, God of Victory, and Gisela, Blade of Goldnight. I just love having these guys around, and they work in any Boros deck.

WEAKNESSES:

Heavy reliance on the board state leaves us vulnerable to Board Wipes, and Boros colors has a hard time recurring that.

”SCREW YOU, STUPID SWORD!!!” - That guy, probably Disenchant, by Andrew Goldhawk

Defensive measures likes Propaganda or Silent Arbiter hurt our efforts. We need to bring White’s responses of Disenchant, Oblivion Ring effects, and Return to Dust. Plus any artifacts that can do they same are also good.

We can’t wipe the board easily. While Mass Calcify can be an option, the presence of red cards in our deck, plus White creatures potentially being in other players decks, makes this card less reliable than I like. Alternatively, you can run Avacyn, Angel of Hope, Thalia’s Lancers (to tutor her), plus as many Board wipes as you want.

Boros also lags behind in ramp, so add in the normal - Boros Signet/Cluestone/Keyrune are great, as are basic fetches of Evolving Wild and Terramorphic Expanse. Knight of the White Orchid is great, Land Tax, Solemn Simulacrum, Burnished Heart, Weathered Wayfarer all pricey, all great.

Knight of the White Orchid, by Mark Zug

RATINGS:

Control: 4/10

You don’t have a lot of options outside of White’s Hate creatures and Board wipes, but you can’t use the latter whenever you want since you’re married to the board.

With the exception of the Avacyn + board wipes, you’re relying almost 100% on the board, aside from whatever white single target removal you run.

Aggro: 9/10

This deck rewards aggressive behavior, and does it great. With evasion and team buffs, Anax and Cymede go for the throat. The cards I reccommend are heavily influenced by this idea.

Combo Potential: 7/10

Depends what you mean my combo. There’s lots of potential here without insane levels of power. The commander itself has combo synergy, but doesn’t break the game. 

Overall Power: 4/10

While a decent choice for EDH, and great in Tiny Leaders, it’s a cEDH Tier 4 leader, and lags behind the pack in most respects. And Boros is the weakest EDH color pair.

Versatility: 6/10

There’s a lot of way to build it for a Boros deck. Not unlimited, but they’re there. Unfortunately they’re all limited to aggro versions.

Affordability: 10/10

This is one of the fiscally cheapest commanders I have covered. Easy manabase, easy mechanic to abuse, a lot of stuff at low rarities.

Overall Score: 40/60

A surprisingly respectable score. Anax and Cymede offer aggressive players a lot to work with, and a lot of room to work in. Plus, cards that work well with them are super-budget, or work excellent in other Boros aggro commander decks.

One of the 99: Decent

While it takes some buildaround to use Heroic, Anax and Cymede have a decent body for a creature, and can add a lot of value to an Aggro Boros build.

FINAL VERDICT: 

While a little small, with some work, they make a solid workhorse of a Boros commander. While not a powerhouse, they can hold their own against a lot of decks.

That’s it for now campers! Stay tuned for Angus Mackenzie, Bant god of turbofog decks!

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How PS4’s Most Divisive Exclusives Captured the Console’s Legacy

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The PlayStation 4 will go down as one of the most successful video game consoles ever made. While its success can most easily be measured in sales figures (over 113 million units sold so far), most gamers will likely best remember the PS4 for its incredible library of games, which includes critically-acclaimed exclusives Bloodborne, Uncharted 4, God of War, Horizon Zero Dawn, and Marvel’s Spider-Man.

In that same library, though, are a few games which some PS4 owners will ultimately remember differently than others. That’s obviously normal, but what is somewhat unusual is how the PS4’s three most divisive console exclusives each reveal a key component of how Sony won the PS4/Xbox One console war in terms of hardware sales and how the company will look to continue its success into the PS5/Xbox Series X generation.

You may love them or you may hate them, but each of these three PS4 exclusives tell us something important about the console’s legacy.

Days Gone

For the most part, I found Days Gone to be glitchy, uninspired, and, at times, poorly written to the point of parody. It was a game I really wanted to like but ultimately felt was a solid rental rather than a particularly impressive entry into an otherwise stellar collection of PlayStation exclusives. I honestly didn’t suspect that there would be many fans who would disagree strongly with that assessment once the game was released a couple of days later. 

However, that’s pretty much exactly what happened as exemplified by the noticeable difference between the game’s user and critic scores. The divide between critics and users over Days Gone reignited an already heated debate about the review process, expectations, allegiances, and what some see as a cultural divide between critics and the “average gamer.” Days Gone is still considered to be one of the centerpieces of that debate.

What was the source of that divide? It never comes down to any one factor, but when I think back on the wildly different reactions to Days Gone, I think about what Sony accomplished with its games during the PS4 generation. 

Many of the PlayStation 4’s best exclusives — including God of War, Marvel’s Spider-Man, Horizon Zero Dawn, and Ghost of Tsushima — feature a fairly similar design scheme. That is to say that each of them has an open world (or large world) that features RPG-lite character-building elements, a variety of main and side objectives, and strong character-based stories that encourage you to finish the single-player campaign. It’s essentially an evolution of the open-world action-adventure style that Ubisoft has popularized in the last decade, though it’s really more complex than that. 

The fascinating thing about Sony’s increasing reliance on this basic formula is how various PlayStation first-party studios have found ways to make it feel unique to their games. Each of the titles I mentioned above has its own distinct personality, art direction, tone, and some kind of unique mechanic that separates it from the rest of the exclusives library. While it’s a little odd that God of War allows you to improve Kratos strength through equipment given that he has god-like strength in the first place or that Peter Parker is still discovering so many significant abilities so late into his career, PlayStation’s first-party developers have typically done a very good job of expanding on the formula. 

That’s the strange thing about Days Gone. It’s certainly not devoid of personality — many fans fell in love with its Sons of Anarchy meets The Walking Dead cinematic style — but it often feels like the purest distillation of that “open-world game with RPG-lite elements and a variety of objectives” idea. You would think that the familiarity of its gameplay and zombie apocalypse premise wouldn’t really “inspire” people, yet many gamers passionately praised Days Gone for the way it let them play out a robust Walking Dead-esque scenario while giving them more of that beloved PlayStation formula.

That’s possibly the biggest takeaway from Days Gone divisive legacy and its ultimate success. A glance at the game’s engagement infographic shows that there really does seem to be a sizable number of gamers out there who have bought into the PlayStation formula and will perhaps even overlook a game’s flaws for the chance to dive into a bountiful experience that feels both new and familiar.

A year ago, players took their first ride on the Broken Road. Thanks for sharing all the great memories you’ve had in #DaysGone and amazing photo mode screenshots! We love all of you! 💕🏍️ pic.twitter.com/tFohFefdcy

— Bend Studio #DaysGone (@BendStudio) April 26, 2020

That’s not to say that there aren’t qualities unique to Days Gone but rather that a sizeable portion of the game’s most vocal defenders focus on the PlayStation experience it represents and the fact that in a realistic scenario where most gamers only get to dive into a certain number of games a year, Days Gone has a lot to offer.

During the PS4 generation, Sony invested heavily in a particular design formula. Days Gone suggests that it paid off.

The Last of Us Part 2

Shortly after its release The Last of Us Part 2 became the poster child for many of the most notable controversies of this console generation.

The pathetic blowback over The Last of Us Part 2’s LGBTQ representation reminded us that this was the era that saw the rise of the Gamergate alt-right movement and the toxic culture of bigotry it fueled. Meanwhile, the debate over the game’s relationship between interactivity and storytelling echoed a divide we’ve seen in discussions over so-called walking simulator games. Even the disagreements over the game’s subversive storytelling bring to mind certain discussions about whether creators have an obligation to please fans of a franchise. 

But if you’re talking about what The Last of Us Part 2’s divisive nature tells us about the PlayStation 4’s legacy, then the most interesting talking point may be the scope and nature of the game’s development process and what it says about Sony’s commitment to its first-party partners.

The Last of Us Part 2 was in development for over 6 years, a period which included numerous delays and reportedly quite a bit of crunch. It allegedly cost over $100 million to make, and it doesn’t even feature a multiplayer mode, the seasonal DLC content most gamers have to expect from AAA releases, or any post-launch microtransactions. In many respects, it is not the kind of game that most major publishers pursue in the modern era. 

Sony Interactive Entertainment isn’t most publishers, though. With games like God of War, Horizon Zero Dawn, and The Last of Us Part 2, we’ve seen the publisher reward its most notable first-party studios not only with large production budgets for single-player epics but what seems like complete trust and cooperation. It’s a strategy which brings to mind the message that Sony sent early into the PS4’s lifecycle: this console is about games. 

It’s entirely possible that you didn’t like The Last of Us Part 2. I ended up feeling decidedly mixed about the game. Yet, part of the reason that the PS4 was so successful is that the console boasted a lineup of exclusives that often bested AAA offerings from Activision, EA, or Ubisoft but were less focused on the monetization schemes that often plague games from those other publishers. Sony instead invested in a stable of first-party developers that could deliver compelling experiences you couldn’t get anywhere else but on PlayStation. 

At the same time, the perceived bloat of the AAA development scene, the sometimes absurd amount of money being pumped into the production of such titles, and the way that both of those elements negatively impact the corporate culture of major studios all raise serious questions about the full value of development processes this expensive and time-consuming. 

There is a fiscal and human cost to making these games that heavily suggests crunch- based development cycles are unsustainable in the long-term. If the industry does move away from this style of production, especially for a purely single-player game with little long-term monetization opportunities, then it could be some time before publishers figure out the best way to pursue making games like The Last of Us Part 2.

However, we fully expect that Sony will continue its commitment to its partners’ visions, even as we start to ask new questions about the development process.

Death Stranding

Death Stranding is a very strange game. 

Much of what makes Death Stranding such an oddity stems from the mind of its infamous creator, video game auteur Hideo Kojima. Much like Naughty Dog creative director Neil Druckmann’s work on The Last of Us Part 2, Death Stranding is very much representative of the unique mind of its creator. The writing, characters, and themes of Kojima games are typically divisive, and Death Stranding’s bizarre contributions in all of those respects represent what you could call “Kojima unchained.”

The key difference between a game like The Last of Us Part 2 and Death Stranding is that Death Stranding was not developed by a first-party PlayStation studio. In fact, the game is available on PC (though it remains a PlayStation console exclusive). Furthermore, unlike other PS4 exclusives, Death Stranding doesn’t adhere to that basic gameplay design mentioned above. In fact, its gameplay, which largely emphasizes the difficulty of navigating different types of terrain and making deliveries on time, is possibly its most divisive quality. 

All of that may lead you to believe that Death Stranding is too different to really teach us much about the PlayStation 4’s library and legacy. But that’s not the case. Death Stranding is really just the most recent example of how Sony’s relationship with Japanese developers and creators helped shape the PlayStation 4’s library and define its success. 

It’s no secret that Sony’s relationship with Japan and the PlayStation brand’s popularity among Japanese gamers has been a key component of the company’s success over the years. Microsoft has struggled to make significant headway in that market, and Nintendo’s success doesn’t necessarily seem to noticeably cut into PlayStation’s historical sales figures. In the PS4 generation, we saw Sony build on that market success by investing heavily in notable notable Japanese-developed titles like Bloodborne, Persona 5, and Death Stranding. 

Even if you put aside the regional component, Death Stranding shows us Sony’s unusual commitment to equally unusual console exclusives. Until Dawn was a choose-your-own-adventure tribute to B-horror movies made by a largely unproven studio. It was a hit. Persona 5 was a downright bizarre entry in an equally bizarre franchise — at least by conventional Western design standards. It was a hit. 

Much like how Death Stranding left some gamers feeling disappointed, though, Sony’s commitment to sticking to often eclectic developers and their unusual ideas hasn’t always paid off. David Jaffe’s Drawn to Death was largely a bust,  Team Ico’s The Last Guardian garnered a notably mixed reception, and Quantic Dream’s Detroit: Become Human was well-received but seemed destined to be overshadowed by the rest of the PS4’s major hits. 

Whether or not the homogenization of the AAA games industry will eventually weed out games like Death Stranding remains to be seen, but based on what we’ve seen, it seems like Sony is still committed to giving games that don’t quite fit the conventional blockbuster mold a high-profile home on its platforms. 

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If nothing else, Death Stranding reminds us that it’s harder for a game to be controversial if it doesn’t take a chance on something. Sony took a chance with the PS4’s library and it largely paid off in the end.

The post How PS4’s Most Divisive Exclusives Captured the Console’s Legacy appeared first on Den of Geek.

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33 Fun Facts About Buffy the Vampire Slayer

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33 Fun Facts About Buffy the Vampire Slayer

On the genre-busting television show Buffy the Vampire Slayer, the heroine saved the world—a lot—over the course of seven seasons. Buffy premiered on the WB 21 years ago today; here are a few things you should know about the show. (And this is just the tip of the stake.)

1. THE SHOW IS A SEQUEL OF SORTS TO A MOVIE.

In the late ‘80s, writer Joss Whedon had an idea for a movie that would subvert the horror genre. “I had seen a lot of horror movies, which I love very much, with blond girls getting killed in dark alleys, and I just germinated this idea about how much I would like to see a blond girl go into a dark alley, get attacked by a monster and then kill it,” he said. “And that was sorta the genesis for the movie, Buffy the Vampire Slayer.” The movie, penned by Whedon and directed by Fran Rubel Kuzui, hit theaters in 1992. It starred Kristy Swanson as Buffy, Donald Sutherland as her watcher Merrick, and Luke Perry as her love interest, Pike (David Arquette also starred as Pike’s best friend-turned-vampire Benny). But the film was different from what Whedon had originally intended. “My original script for the movie was kind of dark and scary and it was comedic, but the final product was much more a broad comedy,” he said.

A few years later, the rights holders approached Whedon about making a TV show out of his creation. He wasn’t sure it would work, but “I started to think about it and I came up with the notion of playing all sorts of horror movies in high school and making them metaphors for how frightening and horrible high school is,” he said. “With the show, I kinda wanted to get back to the roots of genuine horror, but with a lot of comedy and a lot of edge and a lot of self reflective sort of examination of horror. But at the same time, get genuinely creepy and hopefully genuinely moving.” And the TV version of Buffy was born.

2. KATIE HOLMES AND RYAN REYNOLDS COULD HAVE STARRED ON THE SHOW.

Could you imagine Katie Holmes as Buffy and Ryan Reynolds as Xander? According to a 2000 biography, before she was Dawson’s Creek’s Joey Potter, Holmes was offered the role of the slayer, but turned it down to go to high school. Reynolds refused the role of Buffy’s wisecracking sidekick. “I love that show and I loved Joss Whedon, the creator of the show, but my biggest concern was that I didn’t want to play a guy in high school,” Reynolds told The Star in 2008. “I had just come out of high school and it was f***ing awful.”

3. GILES WAS THE FIRST ROLE CAST.

According to casting director Marsha Shulman, “Anthony Stewart [Head] was the first person that got cast on the first day we started casting. He was just it.”

Many other actors who read for the part, Whedon said, made Giles too stuffy, but Head’s take was a little sexier. “Tony Head was one of the few people that we saw and instantly knew right away that nobody else was going to play that part,” Whedon said. “He embodied it perfectly.”

4. SARAH MICHELLE GELLAR AND CHARISMA CARPENTER SWAPPED ROLES.

Gellar auditioned for the role of Sunnydale High queen bee Cordelia Chase before eventually being cast as Buffy. “At the time, we were all trying to find our way to make the show something, its own thing apart from the film,” Schulman said in The Watchers Guide. “We didn’t think of Sarah as Buffy because we thought she was too smart and too grounded and not enough of a misfit in a sense, because Buffy was this outsider. How could Sarah be an outsider? She’s so lovely. So we brought her in as Cordelia, and she was fantastic as Cordelia. Then we went to the network, they knew that Sarah was a star from her previous work, and that she could be Buffy, and that we could do that Buffy.”

Carpenter, meanwhile, auditioned for Buffy before being cast as Cordelia. “I think that the way it turned out is the way it was meant to have turned out,” Carpenter told the BBC. “I’m extremely pleased that I wound up with the character that I have for a myriad of reasons. … I don’t know that I would have been ready for that kind of fame if I’d gotten Buffy. So, I think [Buffy] went to the right person.”

5. WILLOW WAS RECAST AFTER THE PILOT WAS SHOT.

Willow, science geek and Buffy’s best friend, was an exceptionally tough part to cast. “We had actually cast someone else in the pilot. It just didn’t work,” Shulman said. “When we got picked up, we always felt that we were going to start again and look for another Willow.”

“I was determined that we wouldn’t have the supermodel in horn rims that you usually see on a TV show,” Whedon said. “I wanted somebody who really had their own shy quirkiness. While the network and I were looking for people, Alyson Hannigan slipped under our radar. She came in and we didn’t really know that she was going to be the guy, and then when she read for the network we were just blown away. She brings so much light and so much tenderness to the role, it’s kind of extraordinary.”

6. DAVID BOREANAZ WAS DISCOVERED BY THE CASTING DIRECTOR’S FRIEND.

Whedon, the network, and the casting director saw a number of guys read for Buffy’s eventual boyfriend (and vampire!) Angel before David Boreanaz auditioned. “The breakdown said the most gorgeous, mysterious, fantastic, the most incredible man on the face of the earth,” Shulman said. “I think I saw every guy in town. It was the day before shooting, and a friend of mine and called me and said to me ‘You know, there’s this guy that lives on my street who walks his dog every day and I don’t know what he does but he has all the things you’re describing.’ And the minute he walked in the room, I wrote down on my notes: This is the guy.”

Still, despite the fact that Boreanaz gave “very good read,” Whedon wasn’t sold on him. “He wasn’t exactly my type,” he said. “I wasn’t sure we necessarily had the guy here until I asked the women in the room, who had turned into puddles the moment he walked in. I had to defer to them—they seemed to know better than me, and thank god I did, because David turned into a great star and a very solid actor.”

7. THE FIRST VERSION OF THE THEME SONG WAS A DUD.

Whedon wanted the credits sequence—which begins with “this scary organ and then devolves instantly into rock ‘n roll”—to spell out for viewers exactly what the show was about: “Here’s a girl who has no patience for a horror movie, who is not going to be the victim, is not going to be in the scary organ horror movie,” he said. “She’s going to bring her own youth and rocking attitude to it.”

Dissatisfied with an early version of the theme, Whedon opened it up in a contest of sorts to local indie bands. It was Hannigan who suggested Nerf Herder; the band ultimately wrote and recorded the show’s theme. “They created the show and were filming the first season and the people there … hired some fancy pants Hollywood guy to write the theme song and they didn’t like it; they wanted something more rocking, I guess,” Nerf Herder’s lead singer, Parry Gripp, said. “So they asked a bunch of local, small time bands who they could pay very little money to come up with some ideas and they liked our idea and they used it. And the rest is history!”

The band rerecorded the theme in the second or third season because the first recording was a hasty affair, and the song went off-tempo in the middle, Whedon said.

8. THE SHOW SHOT IN A WAREHOUSE—AND AT ACTUAL SCHOOLS.

In the beginning, Buffy didn’t have much of a budget, so instead of shooting on a soundstage, the crew used a huge warehouse in Santa Monica, California. “We were very much on a tight budget,” Whedon said. “This hall you’ll see a lot of in the first 12 episodes. It is the entire school. We only had the one hall, so we use it over and over again. It’s really kind of sad, actually.” The outside of the warehouse also doubled as the entrance to Sunnydale’s only club, The Bronze. “When we designed the club, we put the door to the club on the outside of the actual warehouse so that we could go in from the outside because that would give it real life and make it very realistic,” Whedon said. “And of course we did it just once, and then once more in the third season, because you have to wait until night to shoot, go in and out and light it, and it’s just enormously complicated.”

Torrance High School in Los Angeles subbed in for the exterior of fictional Sunnydale High. It’s a popular spot for film and TV; you might also recognize it from Beverly Hills, 90210, The Secret Life of the American Teenager, 90210, She’s All That, Not Another Teen Movie, and more. And when Buffy went to college, most of Sunnydale University was shot in the warehouse, but some parts of the first episode of the fourth season were shot at UCLA.

9. THERE WAS A REASON FOR THE VAMPIRES’ CREEPY FACES—AND THE “DUSTING.”

In the Buffy movie, the vampires looked like regular people with sharper teeth and paler skin. But for the show, Whedon wanted to increase the sense of paranoia by making the vampires resemble normal people until it’s time to feed—at which point, they transform into monsters. But there was another reason, too. “I didn’t think I really wanted to put a show on the air about a high school girl who was stabbing normal-looking people in the heart,” Whedon said. “I thought somehow that might send the wrong message, but when they are clearly monsters, it takes it to a level of fantasy that is safer.”

Getting into vamp mode—which required a prosthetic that fit from the forehead down to the bottom of the nose—took about an hour and 20 minutes. “It can be tedious,” David Boreanaz said in 1998, “and taking it off is the worst part, because you have to sit there and you just want to rip the damn thing off—but you can’t, because you’ll take a piece of your skin with you. It has to be removed very delicately. But the end result is definitely worth it.”

The film also had vampire bodies lay where they fell after they were staked. But Whedon had different ideas for the show. “It was a very conscious decision to have [the vampires] turn to dust, clothes and all, because I didn’t think it would be fun to have 15 minutes of let’s clean up the bodies after every episode,” he said. The show’s visual effects artists worked on and refined the technique over the seasons.

10. THE CREATORS DREW ON EXISTING VAMPIRE LORE FOR THE SHOW.

But they didn’t use everything. Vampires don’t fly on Buffy or turn into bats  because the show didn’t have the money and Whedon thought it looked silly. Other elements of vampire lore, however, were used: Vampires don’t have reflections; they can’t enter a house unless they’re invited; they’re vulnerable to garlic, crosses, sunlight, fire, and holy water; and they can be killed by beheading or via a stake through the heart.

11. GELLAR HAD SOME PROBLEMS WITH THE DIALOGUE.

The show was famous for its “Buffyspeak,” which was partially inspired by California Valleygirl-isms and how Whedon and the other writers spoke. For Gellar, though, that dialogue sometimes was an issue. “Joss has his own sort of language that’s difficult for us mere mortals to understand,” she said in 1998. “I grew up in New York. We didn’t have Valley girls, and constantly, I’m asking him ‘What does this mean? I’m not quite sure.’ There’s a very funny story about [my audition] where the first line is ‘What’s the sitch?’ And there I go walking in, and my first ‘What does this mean?’ No idea it meant situation. Talk about blowing a job instantly.”

12. HERE’S WHERE YOU’VE SEEN SEASON ONE’S BIG VILLAIN BEFORE.

Underneath all of the Master’s vampy makeup is actor Mark Metcalf, who has appeared in Animal House (he played Doug Neidermeyer) and Seinfeld (he played The Maestro), among many other films and television shows. “Most of the guys we read came in and gave us villain villain villain in a very unimaginative way,” Whedon said. “Mark’s not that character, he’s just sly. He undercut all of the villainousness with real charm.”

13. THE CAST AND CREW HATED THE LIBRARY SCENES.

Head delivered much of the show’s expository dialogue in the library—and cast and crew alike came to dread those scenes. “He’s brought so much to all these really tough speeches, giving them life where they had very little because they’re full of so much information,” Whedon said. “When we finally blew up the school at the end of season three and were in the library for the last time, everybody breathed a great sigh of relief because these became the bane for us when we were filming, to go back into this space and talk yet again about what the peril was going to be.”

14. DARLA WAS SUPPOSED TO DIE IN THE SECOND EPISODE.

The vampire (played by Julie Benz) was supposed to expire at the end of “The Harvest” after Willow doused her with holy water, but Whedon kept her alive because he thought Buffy and Angel’s romance would be more interesting if it was a triangle; Darla, of course, was Angel’s sire. She was eventually killed in episode seven, but would continue to pop up in other episodes—and in the spin-off show, Angel—from time to time.

15. GELLAR AND BOREANAZ WOULD EAT GROSS STUFF BEFORE KISSING SCENES.

In a 2002 interview with The Independent, Gellar called love scenes “the unsexiest thing in the world.” What she and Boreanaz did beforehand couldn’t have made it any sexier. “[We] were the worst,” she said. “We would do horrible things to each other. Like eat tuna fish and pickle before we kissed. If he had to unbutton my shirt or trousers I would pin them or sew them together to make it as hard as I could. Once I even dropped ice cream on him.”

16. THE SHOW BUILT ITS OWN GRAVEYARD.

In the first season, Buffy shot in a graveyard in Hollywood. “It meant going out all night, until sunrise, a lot of times,” Whedon said. “That was back when we had the energy for that kind of thing.” Starting in the second season, they created their own graveyard in the warehouse’s parking lot. “It made our lives a whole lot easier, but it doesn’t give you the scope that you get from [the Hollywood graveyard],” Whedon said. “It’s a really beautiful place. Looks great.”

“We poured in kerb, back-filled it with dirt and planted grass and lots of trees and stuff and that’s our graveyard set,” production designer Carey Meyer told the BBC. “The majority of our cemetery stuff actually takes place in that little tiny parking lot. At night, with a couple of headstones in the background with all the trees and such, you can really cheat to make it look quite large.”

17. WHEDON HAD AN INTERESTING NICKNAME FOR GELLAR.

At a cast reunion in 2008, Whedon revealed—to Gellar’s surprise—an odd nickname for her, borne from the fact that she dealt with so much pain on screen. “David [Greenwalt] and I used to crow, when we realized what Sarah could do,” he said. “We used to call her Jimmy Stewart, because he was the greatest American in pain in the history of film.” Gellar laughed and said “I never knew that!”

18. AT LEAST TWO ACTORS PLAYED MORE THAN ONE VILLAIN.

Brian Thompson, who played vampire Luke in the first two episodes, returned in the second season to play The Judge. “Quite frankly, we were in a hurry,” Whedon said. “We already had his face cast and we knew he could put makeup on and give us a good performance.” Camden Toy, meanwhile, played a number of villains, including one of the Gentlemen in “Hush” (season four), a skin-eating demon called Gnarl in “Same Time, Same Place” (season seven), and Ubervamp Turok-Han (throughout season seven).

19. THE WRITERS HAD THEIR OWN TERM FOR PLOT-MOVING DEVICES.

It was coined by writer David Greenwalt. “A lot of this stuff is based on myth and horror movies, and a lot of it made up for our convenience,” Whedon says. “At one point, when we were trying to figure out exactly what Buffy would be trying to do [in the first episode], Greenwalt just shouted out ‘For God’s sake, don’t touch the phlebotnum in Jar C!’ We have no idea to this day what it was supposed to mean, but it became our word for the vague mystical thing—such as the master’s cork in the bottle theory—so phlebotnum is our constant on the show.”

20. WHEDON WROTE THE LARGELY DIALOGUE-FREE EPISODE “HUSH” TO CHALLENGE HIMSELF.

Season four’s tenth episode, “Hush,” features creepy villains called The Gentlemen, who come to Sunnydale and steal the residents’ voices … so that no one can scream when the monsters cut out their hearts. There are only 17 minutes of spoken dialogue in the 44 minute episode. Whedon wanted to do a largely silent episode because he felt like he was phoning it in. “I had fallen into the ‘people a-yakkin, I can sort of do this without really thinking about it’ style of directing, and I wanted to curtail that in myself,” he said. “On a practical level, the idea of doing an episode where everybody loses their voice presented itself as a great big challenge because I knew that I would literally have to tell the story only visually, and that would mean that I couldn’t fall back on tricks. I wanted to do something harder.” Though Whedon was terrified that he wouldn’t be able to pull off the episode, it was well received by critics, and is a favorite of fans and the series’ stars alike.

21. THE GENTLEMEN WERE INSPIRED BY A DREAM.

A version of Buffy’s creepiest villains first appeared in a dream of Whedon’s; they floated toward him while he was in bed. “What I was going for was very specifically a very Victorian kind of feel, because that to me is very creepy and fairytale-like,” Whedon said. He created a drawing, which he delivered to makeup supervisor Todd McIntosh and John Vulich at Optic Nerve, the special effects house that created the prosthetics for the show. “I was drawing on everything that had ever frightened me, including the fellow from my dream, Nosferatu, pinhead, Mr. Burns—anything that gave that creepy feel,” Whedon said. “We get into a lot of reptilian monsters and things that look kind of like aliens, and what I wanted from these guys was, very specifically, fairy tales. I wanted guys who would remind people of what would they were scared of when they were children.”

Whedon’s ultimate hope was that kids of a certain generation would be as traumatized by the Gentlemen as he was by the Zuni Doll from Trilogy of Terror. The team cast mimes and actors who had done creature work—like Doug Jones—to play the Gentlemen.

22. THE HARDEST CHARACTER FOR WHEDON TO KILL OFF WAS BUFFY’S MOM.

One of Buffy‘s most critically acclaimed episodes is season five’s “The Body,” in which the slayer’s mom, played by Kristine Sutherland, dies of natural causes. Whedon said in a 2012 Reddit AMA that Joyce was the toughest character for him to kill. He did the episode, he said in DVD commentary, because “I wanted to show not the meaning or catharsis or the beauty of life or any of the things that are often associated with loss, or even extreme grief, which we do get in the episode. But what I did want to capture was the extreme physicality, the almost boredom of the very first few hours. I wanted to be very specific about what it felt like the moment you discover you’ve lost someone. And so what appears to many people as a formal exercise—no music, scenes that take up almost the entire act, if not the entire act, without end—is all done for a very specific purpose, which is to put you in that moment of dumbfounded shock, that airlessness of losing somebody.”

The moments after Buffy discovers her mother dead on the couch were done in a single take, which Whedon had Gellar perform seven times (the actress has called the episode one of her favorites). “The cameraman had the camera on his shoulder the whole time and was running around,” Whedon said. “It wasn’t a steadicam—he had no harness because I wanted that urgency of handheld, that you’re in the moment of it. It’s an extraordinary piece of acting from Sarah … to go from the extremity of first finding her, the helplessness of not knowing what to do. All the things that Sarah had to go through in this, she had to go through many, many times. And every take was extraordinary.”

23. ONE SHOT IN “THE BODY” WAS INSPIRED BY DIRECTOR PAUL THOMAS ANDERSON.

One shot in “The Body” follows the coroner after he examines Joyce’s body out to where Buffy waits with her friends in another single take. “I am a huge Paul Thomas Anderson fan,” Whedon said, “and I had been watching Magnolia excessively before I shot this. So these endless tracking shots probably owe something to that. What can I say, I’m a hack. But what I was really trying to get at here was, again, the reality of the space. I wanted to see Joyce very clearly, and then I wanted to walk all the way over to where Buffy was, where her loved ones were, so that you understood she was down the hall, she was really there. We weren’t on a different set.” Whedon gave kudos to production designer Carey Meyer for building sets that would let him get those long takes.

24. GELLAR KNEW WHAT WOULD HAPPEN IN SEASON FIVE WELL IN ADVANCE.

Several moments in the final episode of season three foreshadowed two major events in season five: Namely, that Buffy would get a sister (Dawn, played by Michelle Trachtenberg) and that the slayer would die at the end of season five. “I’ve actually known the [plot of the] entire last season for about three years,” she told the BBC. “There was a dream sequence that Buffy had with Faith. Faith had a riddle, and it was something like ‘Little Miss Muffet, sitting on her tuffet,’ counting down from whatever the numbers were, and I went to Joss to ask what it meant. That’s when he explained to me that I was going to have a sister, that Dawn, the character of Dawn, would be coming on the show. I think that’s exactly when I became aware also of what the future plans were.”

Why manufacture a sister out of thin air? “Part of the mission statement was, let’s have a really important, intense emotional relationship for Buffy that is not a boyfriend,” he told Salon. “Because let’s not have her be defined by her boyfriend every time out of the bat. So, Season 5, she’s as intense as she was in Season 2 with Angelus, but it’s about her sister. To me that was really beautiful.”

25. SEASON SIX WAS THE TOUGHEST FOR GELLAR.

After the fifth season, Buffy moved from the WB to UPN and resurrected its heroine for the sixth season—which was darker in tone (and more controversial) than any season before it. “It was definitely tough for me,” Gellar said at a Paley Center event in 2008. “It’s so hard to separate myself from her, so it was tough for me to see these situations and say ‘But Buffy wouldn’t do this.’ … I know Joss and Marti both had to talk me off a ledge a couple of times because it just felt so far removed from me at the time, and maybe that was the point. Maybe I was struggling the same way she was struggling to find out who she was. It just felt so foreign to me. … We love her, and I think it was hard for all of us to watch her suffer. … It was a tough time. And I think that’s what came through in the end, and that was great. When Buffy herself resurfaced, we sort of found our voice again.”

26. WRITER/PRODUCER MARTI NOXON HAS A CAMEO.

She’s the lady with the parking ticket in “Once More, With Feeling.”

27. GELLAR CALLED THE MUSICAL EPISODE “DAUNTING.”

“I’m a perfectionist, I come from a long line of lots of preparation, and certainly that was not the case with this,” she said. “If I had my druthers, we would have gotten it about two years ago and been in classes for a year and a half, maybe six weeks of rehearsals? Instead of four days.” At a Paley Center event in 2008, Gellar admitted to “begging” to be let out of it. “I begged for Buffy the rat,” she said. “I kept thinking, ‘Bring the rat back.’”

28. STONE TEMPLE PILOTS’ LEAD SINGER WAS A FAN.

Scott Weiland reportedly became a fan while watching the show in prison. Gellar, who later appeared in the band’s music video for “Sour Girl,” had a theory about why the show was so popular among prison inmates: “Hot chicks doing battle. It’s like acceptable porn.”

29. GELLAR KNEW THE SHOW WAS OVER BEFORE THE REST OF THE CAST.

In the March 7, 2003 Entertainment Weekly cover story, Gellar announced that Buffy was coming to an end after seven seasons. “I love this job, I love the fans,” she said. “I love telling the stories we tell. This isn’t about leaving for a career in movies, or in theater—it’s more of a personal decision. I need a rest. Teachers get sabbaticals. Actors don’t.” The rest of the cast found out the day the story hit stands. “I was devastated,” Hannigan said in 2013. “I was just very shocked.”

30. BUFFY’S ADVENTURES CONTINUE IN COMIC BOOKS.

A number of writers who worked on the TV show have also worked on the comics. Even James Marsters, who played vampire Spike on the show, wrote a comic about his character. “I was at the San Diego Comic Con and I was describing an idea that had been kicking around my head for a long time to [artist] George Jeanty, who draws a lot of the Buffy comic books,” Marsters told io9. “And he thought that it was a fabulous idea and that I should definitely get in touch with [Dark Horse editor] Scott Allie. He made the phone call and then I pitched it to Scott over the phone and Scott liked it a lot. It’s a story that was going to try to be made into a Spike movie years and years ago.”

31. THERE WAS TALK OF AN ANIMATED SERIES.

Whedon and the show’s other writers produced seven scripts for an animated Buffy series, which would have taken place during the show’s first three seasons and been voiced by the cast. Sadly, no one wanted the show. “They were really fun to write,” Whedon said. “We could not sell the show. We could not sell an animated Buffy, which I still find incomprehensible.”

32. THE SHOW SPAWNED ACADEMIC COURSES…

A number of colleges and universities offer courses on the show; they’re called “Buffy Studies.” People have written books and held conferences dedicated to discussing the themes of the show and presenting papers on it. According to the Los Angeles Times, attendees at a 2004 Buffy conference “were presenting 190 papers on topics ranging from ‘slayer slang’ to ‘postmodern reflections on the culture of consumption’ to ‘Buffy and the new American Buddhism.’ There was even a self-conscious talk by David Lavery, an English professor at Middle Tennessee State University, on Buffy studies ‘as an academic cult.'”

An informal study conducted by Slate in 2012 showed that, when it comes to pop culture in academia, Buffy is number one: “More than twice as many papers, essays, and books have been devoted to the vampire drama than any of our other choices—so many that we stopped counting when we hit 200.”

33. … AND A BOOK OF SLANG.

Publisher’s Weekly called Slayer Slang: A Buffy the Vampire Slayer Lexicon “a strange marriage of a fan guide and a linguistics textbook.” Said The Kansas City Star: “If you’re curious about the word ‘ubersuck,’ or just want to remember which episode you first heard it in, this is the place to look. As Buffy would say, it is not uncool.”

BONUS: RARE BEHIND-THE-SCENES FOOTAGE

During the second season, Pruitt filmed behind-the-scenes footage of the cast goofing off and getting into makeup, the stunt crew at work, and some of the show’s most iconic sequences. You can watch it above.

Additional sources: DVD commentary; The Watcher’s Guide.

All images courtesy of Getty Images unless otherwise noted.

This piece originally ran in 2014.